You have to fail to succeed. True for any business,but like your wonderful stories exemplify, there is nothing quite like Hollywood and its rollercoaster of possibilities. Love these quality episodes Mike!
Powerful lessons on the video as always ! 👍 Couple of questions from an outsider looking in: 1.When you pitch an idea to an Agent or a studio executive, what is holding them from taking your idea and run with it on their own and cut you out?? 2. You did write the first 3 episodes of the mob series with your colleagues and Im guessing you were paid for the work but cant you shop the idea (with the 3 episodes already written) elsewere if they back out ?? (Especially if you go to FX or Showtime etc. and tell them "HBO bought my mob show but they also bought a similar , do you want it instead to compete with each other" ) 😅
Thanks for the questions…. 1) nothing is stopping them. Pitching your idea is a necessary risk we all take. Agents or movie execs stealing your idea isn’t as common as one would think - but it has happened to me. It’s just part of the game. U try your best to move on. The way it’s done (again it’s pretty rare) is they will use the ESSENCE of your idea and give it to another writer (client or friend) and then a year later u see something that looks “familiar” out there. 2) with BOTH of these shows we were locked in for a five year period with the respective nets that bought the material. Yes I got paid but HBO and ABC owned the material for five years and they’re not very keen on allowing a rival network to take it from them so they hold onto it. It’s unfortunate that they don’t like to share the material but it does happen sometimes. Take for example “breaking bad”… fix was the network that originally bought that show and even produced the pilot! They didn’t wanna pick it up to series and Vince Gilligan pleaded with them to let him have the rights to the pilot back to resell it. They thought it was so useless that they let it go. We all know what happened from there! But again that’s a rarity. Thanks so much for the thoughtful questions!
@@MikeSoccio Thanks for getting back to me! I've heard the situation with Paul Blart:Mall cop vs Observe and Report. Allegedly the Observe and Report script leaked and maybe Adam Sandler's Production company liked it enough to steal the essence ( loser cop in a mall comedy) and also beat them to the punch on releasing the movie. But yeah that probably an exception to the rule. Also Im guessing studios and producers dont go stealing peoples ideas because they afraid of possible legal disputes later on. I've heard studios dont want to be send unsolicited scripts in fear that it may resemble something they work on. Pixar I think does everything in-house and doesnt accept submissions of any kind.
@@fotisxevgenisactually I was remotely involved in the pre-production of Mall Cop and I can tell you with one hundred percent certainty that the idea was an original and had nothing to do w observe and report. Just dumb luck two mall cop films were being produced around the same time.
You have to fail to succeed. True for any business,but like your wonderful stories exemplify, there is nothing quite like Hollywood and its rollercoaster of possibilities. Love these quality episodes Mike!
Yessssss!!! And thank you!
interesting story!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Powerful lessons on the video as always ! 👍
Couple of questions from an outsider looking in:
1.When you pitch an idea to an Agent or a studio executive, what is holding them from taking your idea and run with it on their own and cut you out??
2. You did write the first 3 episodes of the mob series with your colleagues and Im guessing you were paid for the work but cant you shop the idea (with the 3 episodes already written) elsewere if they back out ?? (Especially if you go to FX or Showtime etc. and tell them "HBO bought my mob show but they also bought a similar , do you want it instead to compete with each other" ) 😅
Thanks for the questions….
1) nothing is stopping them. Pitching your idea is a necessary risk we all take. Agents or movie execs stealing your idea isn’t as common as one would think - but it has happened to me. It’s just part of the game. U try your best to move on. The way it’s done (again it’s pretty rare) is they will use the ESSENCE of your idea and give it to another writer (client or friend) and then a year later u see something that looks “familiar” out there.
2) with BOTH of these shows we were locked in for a five year period with the respective nets that bought the material. Yes I got paid but HBO and ABC owned the material for five years and they’re not very keen on allowing a rival network to take it from them so they hold onto it. It’s unfortunate that they don’t like to share the material but it does happen sometimes. Take for example “breaking bad”… fix was the network that originally bought that show and even produced the pilot! They didn’t wanna pick it up to series and Vince Gilligan pleaded with them to let him have the rights to the pilot back to resell it. They thought it was so useless that they let it go. We all know what happened from there! But again that’s a rarity.
Thanks so much for the thoughtful questions!
@@MikeSoccio Thanks for getting back to me!
I've heard the situation with Paul Blart:Mall cop vs Observe and Report.
Allegedly the Observe and Report script leaked and maybe Adam Sandler's Production company liked it enough to steal the essence ( loser cop in a mall comedy) and also beat them to the punch on releasing the movie. But yeah that probably an exception to the rule.
Also Im guessing studios and producers dont go stealing peoples ideas because they afraid of possible legal disputes later on.
I've heard studios dont want to be send unsolicited scripts in fear that it may resemble something they work on. Pixar I think does everything in-house and doesnt accept submissions of any kind.
@@fotisxevgenisactually I was remotely involved in the pre-production of Mall Cop and I can tell you with one hundred percent certainty that the idea was an original and had nothing to do w observe and report. Just dumb luck two mall cop films were being produced around the same time.
@@fotisxevgenisbut yea once the studios realized the other was being released it becomes a competition to get theirs out first or most effectively!